


The End of Chaos

by ArcticLucie



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, First Meetings, I Made Myself Cry, Love at First Sight, M/M, Malex Week 2020, Reincarnation, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-19
Updated: 2020-07-19
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:55:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25384891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArcticLucie/pseuds/ArcticLucie
Summary: When Michael and Alex meet, it's not always pretty. The details may change, but their love never does.
Relationships: Michael Guerin/Alex Manes
Comments: 10
Kudos: 52





	The End of Chaos

**Author's Note:**

> Malex day 7, here just have all the AUs (list in the end notes)
> 
> If you want to skip the MCDs, they're in the Ancient Rome and Western verses.

They start as One, a single point of light fractured down the middle and forced further and further apart by an increase in entropy until all they know is chaos.

//

Mig grunts, rage welling inside his primitive brain as he watches the tip of a stranger’s spear pierce the flesh of his dinner. He goes a little crazy. The small woodland creature falls limp, and he rips it from the snare, clutching it to his chest as the intruder nears.

Ake grunts back, inching forward, bare feet dead silent among the forest’s detritus.

Mig grunts, eyes wary, then growls at the other, sniffs the air around him, recognizes something familiar in the way he breathes, in the way Mig’s heart ticks up, but not out of fear.

Ake grunts.  _ I know you. _ He pulls the spear from the animal and waves it at Mig.

Mig grunts, unimpressed.  _ I know you. _ He points toward his cave and they split the kill.

//

Alexander rubs his temples. They can’t hold out much longer. The enemy forces have them surrounded, and if they don’t find a weakness in their ranks, the entire legion will fall. The problem is the enemy doesn’t have a weakness. And he knows it. They have a day at most before their own ranks start to crumble. The northern legions won’t make it in time to offer support. As second in command, he knows a losing battle when he sees one. 

Tomorrow they will all march to their deaths.

“You need to rest, Alexander,” Micantis says, slipping into his tent with a practiced ease only achieved after years of serving together. They compliment each other well, Alexander’s most brilliant strategist. Their enemies never stood a chance when they fought shoulder to shoulder. But that will all end tomorrow.

He stands up from the table and walks heavy footed toward his bed. Micantis meets him there, settling in beside him, his presence the only thing Alexander will miss from this life. He’ll fight hard, and he will die a valiant death. They both will.

Micantis tucks him into bed, always taking care of him, that one. But Alexander reaches out for him as he turns to leave.

“Please stay, just for tonight. I don’t want to be alone.”

Micantis nods and slips under the blankets, pulling Alexander close, and they don’t need to talk to read each other’s thoughts. Never have. He knows Micantis is aware of what tomorrow holds for them, and it’s buzzing between them. Micantis’ warm breath on his neck soothes him to sleep in spite of his worries, the best night of it he’s ever had, but it’s wretched from him far too soon when a century sounds the alarm just before dawn.

They take up arms, and they fight.

Micantis goes down first, and Alexander watches the sword slicing through his side as he falls. He can hardly see through his rage, but he takes six more enemy soldiers down with him, saving the man who’d wounded Micantis for last. Then he falls to his knees at his side, the battle soon forgotten, as their haggard breaths turn to clouds in the early morning light, but they’re fading. 

The arrows in Alexander’s side make it hard for him to breathe, but it doesn’t stop him from pulling his beloved against his chest, from pressing his lips to his temple. It’s his turn to hold on tight. Blood soaked curls stick to his cheek as he mutters in Micantis’ ear until he can’t talk anymore, but he doesn’t let go, intent on holding him until his own body gives out and then long after.

//

The shackles around his ankles have started to bite into his skin, and Michael wants to break the joints so he can slip them off. He hasn’t seen Alex in days. He doesn’t even know if he’s still alive. He hopes, but he doesn’t know. The mutiny had happened so fast, and he’d lost sight of him. Now, he sits chained to the bowels of his own cursed ship and all he can think about is Alex.

They hadn’t seen it coming. Pirates had loud mouths, but the dissenters had kept it quiet, the ambush swift and stealthy, and he’d almost be impressed if they weren’t going to kill him. Goddamn pirates. When he’d started swashbuckling, pirates had honor, rough and quick to anger, but they had a code. 

Not anymore.

He just wishes they would get on with it already. They took his ship, they took his lover, they even took his hook. He literally had nothing left but the blood stained clothes on his back, though technically they’re Alex’s, so he really had nothing.

“Where’s Alex?” he demands when they come down to get him. They don’t reply. He struggles as they haul him up on deck, the salty air heavy in his lungs. He squints into the sunset and puts up the fight of his life when they drag him over to the plank.

“Where is Alex?” he yells again when the new captain finally shows his ugly face. He has a nasty gash on his chin, and Michael smiles remembering how his dagger felt in his hand when he put it there. It looks infected. Good.

“He abandoned ship,” the captain replies.

“Bullshit!”

“We saw him,” one of the deck hands confirms, and Michael’s face falls. That doesn’t sound like Alex at all. He was always such a fighter, he’d never surrender, he’d never flee, he’d fight to the death. Or at least until a backstabbing pirate knocked him out and chained him up.

“What’d you do with him?”

The captain steps closer, and yep, he looks violently ill, a river of pus draining down his chin. At this rate, he’ll probably die before Michael ever hits the water. “Your cowardly lover jumped ship with the ruby skull,” he sneers.

And Michael laughs. Okay,  _ that _ sounded like Alex. Leave it to him to piss off the mutineers by hurling himself into the sea with the most precious, most valuable thing on board. He smiles proud and receives a fist to the gut for his troubles.

He doubles over and sags in the arms of men he’d fought beside for years, but he doesn’t recognize them now. No honor. No code. Good riddance.

“Walk the plank,” the captain orders before he slips back into the crowd, probably to find a place to lay down and die.

Michael obeys because he has no choice, but even if he did, he’d still choose to end it like this. He has nothing left now. No point in dragging it out, no point in mourning the love of his life when he can so easily join him in death.

So, he closes his eyes, thinks of the man he’s loved for what feels like centuries, and he jumps. And he sinks. The darkness creeps in around him as his lungs start to burn. He panics but only for a moment, then his world goes black.

*

His eyelids feel heavy when he tries to open them. “Alex,” he calls out, but his voice sounds funny to his ears, a garbled mess, like he’s under water, and oh shit, he drowned. Did he? He sits up, his eyes popping wide open, and yep, he’s underwater. 

But he can  _ breathe. _

Something shiny catches his eye and he looks down to where his legs should be, but all he sees is a tail, beautiful and coppery and glinting like diamonds in the dim light of the cave he thinks he’s in. “What?”

“Oh, thank Triton you’re awake,” Alex says, rushing to his side to take his hand. “I wasn’t sure the spell would work. I gave her the ruby skull, but you can’t always trust sea witches, so I was worried, but it worked, Michael. You’re alive.”

“Alex,” he says. “What happened to my legs?”

“Okay, don’t be mad, but a sea witch owed me a favor and I had her turn you into a merman in exchange for the ruby skull we stole from that British ship a few months back. It’s the only way I could save your life.”

Michael runs his hand through ocean soaked curls and processes that. Or tries to but he’s distracted by the shimmering gold fins flaring out from where Alex’s leg used to be. They’re beautiful, but everything about Alex is. “You’re a merman?”

Alex frowns as he nods. “Sorry I never told you, but I didn’t know how you’d react. And I never thought I’d return to the sea, not after finding you. I thought we’d retire together and walk off into the sunset. On land.”

“Baby,” Michael starts, pulling Alex close and taking the opportunity to run his fingers over his smooth golden scales. “We’re alive, and we’re together. And this might take some getting used to,” he says as he gives an experimental wiggle of his new tail. “But that’s all that really matters.”

Alex’s smile is just as gorgeous as he remembered it. 

Making love underwater is an interesting experience, but they’ll get used to it. Together.

//

One Foot Hawk has had an eye on the explorer for a while now as he slips through the trees behind him unnoticed. The stranger’s light skin is radiant, all but glowing in the rays that pours in through tiny holes in the canopy. He’s heard tales of pale skinned explorers, some good, most bad, and he thinks it’s best to keep his distance. But the man’s eyes, they sparkle, and One Foot can’t help the intrigue that sprouts inside him.

_ I know you. _

Eventually, the man stops to rest on a fallen log, and One Foot let’s himself get a little closer. Everything about the stranger is novel and foreign, but something has One Foot curious. The man feels familiar in the way the spirits do, and he thinks maybe they’ve guided him here, guided both of them here.

He swallows hard when the man throws his head back and takes a drink, the movement of his throat surprisingly captivating, and he longs to move closer, but he doesn’t. Not yet.

They wander for hours through the forest, mostly in circles. The man is clearly lost now, but One Foot grew up among the tree spirits. He knows them. He wonders why the man doesn’t ask them for guidance. Maybe he doesn’t know how. That makes him frown because he’s heard the tales. The man’s ancestors must’ve turned their back on the spirits and must’ve been stripped of their vision. Maybe that’s why he has no color.

A sinister pop startles him, and his bones beg him to flee, to abandon his pursuit. But his man is staggering now, he’s hurt, and something deep inside compels him to help. He preps an arrow and waits, eyes scanning the forest until he spots movement in the distance, another pale skinned intruder. Something shiny in his hand sparks with another pop.

His man, with honey eyes now wide with terror, almost runs into him in his retreat. His hand is scarlet, drops of blood painting the forest floor. He speaks in a tongue One Foot doesn’t understand, but his fear, that’s universal. The spirits whisper that the fear isn’t meant for him, so he lets his arrow fly, straight and true, and it hits its mark in the distance.

One Foot takes his injured man back to his wigwam; his man never leaves it. 

And One Foot Hawk reconnects One Hand Hawk to the spirits. 

//

Michael’s ass is sore from riding, thighs chafed to shit from the saddle. They’ve been out here for days running from the law. Iz hadn’t meant to kill those girls down in Roswell, but she did, and they can’t take it back. He passes his canteen to Max when he asks for it and tries to hide his chuckle when his brother discovers it’s bone dry.

“We should double back to that creek and refill our cantees. Maybe rest for a bit,” Max says. Michael doesn’t want to turn back. He wants to keep heading west, chasing the sun, but he concedes when Iz gives him the puppy dog eyes.

“It’s your funeral,” he mutters under his breath.

Things are quiet as they hitch their horses to a tree. The sound of the creek babbles in the background, and he wants to jump in and cool off. The desert heat has him covered in a thin layer of salt, and he could use a good soak. He strips off his shirt, intent on ducking his head in at the least, when all hell breaks loose. The bark from a willow splinters by his ear, and he pulls his Colt from its holster to shoot blindly into the treeline.

An ambush.

He hears Isobel cry out in pain somewhere behind him, sees the flash from Max’s gun in his periphery, but the searing pain in his chest drowns it all out. His hand moves to cover his mortal wound. It’s bloody when he yanks it away, and he looks up at the man who shot him. Instinct has him pulling the trigger, enacting revenge, and the lawman’s eyes go wide when Michael’s bullet hits dead center.

_ But I know you. _

Time slows down then, the lawman’s features coming into focus, and Michael’s chest hurts in an entirely different kind of way.

He should’ve known—in fact, maybe he did—that a Manes Man would be the death of him. He just hadn’t anticipated it would be this one, that it would end like this, before it had even begun, with two bullets by a creek under the summer sun. But it does.

//

Alex slumps down in his desk and doodles on his Calc homework. Mrs. Delaney is droning on about something when the door slams open and all eyes jump to the kid standing in the doorway. His curls are atrocious in the best kind of way, and Alex wants to run his fingers through them immediately, but he slinks further down into his seat instead.

“Are you the transfer student?” Mrs. Delaney asks.

“Michael Guerin,” he replies with a nod.

“There’s an empty desk by Alex.”

Alex shoots up at the mention of his name, and Michael’s eyes lock onto his. Be cool, he’s just a boy. A very pretty boy who has his lungs seizing in his chest the closer he gets. He doesn’t want to tear his eyes away, but his dad’s voice in his head is like a shock to his system, and it shuts him down. He averts his gaze, sinks back into his chair, and tries to disappear into the numbers on his paper.

He grunts in reply when Michael says hi and turns his full attention back to his homework. Or he tries to, but it’s not easy when the kid’s hovering over him, so close he can feel his body heat radiating out from his thigh before it brushes against Alex’s arm. 

He shivers.

“Um, that’s actually x equals negative one third,” Michael says, pointing to the last problem Alex had bothered to solve. Or had attempted anyway.

He wants to hate the guy for pointing out his mistake unprompted, but he doesn’t. He can’t. Instead, he thinks he might be in love.

//

“Captain!” Maria bites out, his first officer unable to disguise the fear in her voice. “ _ Michael, _ we can’t sustain another hit from that dreadnought.”

“Evasive maneuvers.”

“I’m trying my best, Guerin,” helmsman Valenti replies, “but we’ve sustained too much damage. One more hit and we’ll be sitting ducks. If they don’t blow us up first.”

“We’ve lost an engine,” someone else says, but he can no longer distinguish voices. He has a crew to save, and as much as he hates tucking tail and running, sometimes it’s the only viable option.

“Kyle, get us out of here.”

“Aye, sir.”

The jump to lightspeed is rough, and for a minute there he thinks the ship might fall to pieces around them, but she holds together long enough for them to find a safe port. They limp into atmo, and Kyle sits them down in the middle of the closest shipyard.

Michael breathes out a sigh of relief as the engines cut out. “Let’s go meet the locals, shall we?”

“Eager to add another species to your bedpost?” Maria teases as she falls in step beside him.

He wouldn’t say no to that, but after months in space, it’s the feel of dirt beneath his boots and a gentle breeze against his skin that he yearns for the most. He closes his eyes as the seals of the bay doors hiss and waits for the change in pressure to echo across his face. Orange light wraps him in warmth as he walks down the ramp, and his breath catches when his eyes meet those of the one-manned welcoming committee.

_ I know you. _

The alien looks almost human, except for the iridescent shine of his golden skin. It flickers and glows in the light from the small sun, and Michael has never seen anything more beautiful in his life. He’s a treasure, and Michael thinks that maybe somewhere along the line, he might’ve been a pirate.

“My ship’s in need of repairs.”

“Then you’ve come to the right place. I’m  _ very _ good with my hands.”

The alien’s smile is bright and blinding. Michael doesn’t realize he’s staring until Maria elbows him in the ribs. “Uh, I’m Captain Michael Guerin, this is my first officer, Maria DeLuca.”

“Alex Manes, the best mechanic on this tiny backwater planet. My brother and I will get you patched up in no time.”

Michael doesn’t exactly like the sound of that. Because it means in no time, he’ll have to leave.

He sends the crew out to explore the settlement and stays behind to do a walkthrough with Alex. The ship is trashed, but he already knew that.

“This is pretty bad,” Alex says as he wipes his greasy hands on the rag he pulled out of his back pocket, stained coveralls much too baggy for Michael’s liking.

“How long do you think it’ll take?”

Alex rocks on the balls of his feet and shoves the rag back in his pocket. “Best guess, maybe two cycles.”

“Six Earth weeks?”

“I can try and get that down to four, but I wouldn’t push it. Not with this kind of damage.”

Michael sighs and runs a hand through his hair. “No, don’t rush it. We’ve got time, and I’d rather it get done right. How much am I looking at?”

“Four million credits should do it.”

Michael whistles. “Okay, we might have to pick up some odd jobs around here, but I think we can swing it. Got no choice really.”

“Great. Gregory and I will get started tomorrow.”

“Oh, there was one more thing,” Michael says, turning to lead Alex out of the engine room. “The shelving units in my cabin shook loose when we dropped out of lightspeed. Think you could have a look?”

“Sure thing. I do  _ excellent _ work in the bedroom.”

Michael grins. “I think I’ll be the judge of that.”

*

“Come with me,” Michael says. Alex had finished the repairs almost a week ago, and he is running out of excuses to stay. “We’re in need of a good engineer on board.”

Alex sits up, the sheets falling down to pool in his lap. “I’m a mechanic, Michael, not an engineer.”

Michael props himself up on his elbow then leans in to press a kiss to Alex’s bicep. The contact tingles, and he doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to it. He certainly doesn’t want to. “Even better.”

“I can’t,” he says, picking at a thread on the sheet. “You know how much my dad despises aliens. You’ve met him. He’d kill me if I ran off with one.”

“Darlin’, I can take you places he’ll never find us.”

Alex swallows, the hope blooming in his eyes makes Michael’s heart sing. “Promise?”

“I promise.”

And he keeps it.

//

It sees something in the distance, something millions of lightyears away and on a collision course headed straight for it. And it waits. Centuries pass, then millennia, hundreds of them while it sits idly by sailing happily on the solar winds, it’s nebula clouds extending further and further out into space, until one day, it recognizes itself.

“I know you,” it says into the void, and it waits a thousand more years for a reply.

“I know you too.”

“I had a name once.”

“I’ve had many. Mig or Michael or something. Now I’m just Alone. What’s yours?”

“One Leg? No, One Foot. Alexander, and a thousand others I can no longer recall. But you’re not Alone. You never have been.”

“Then who am I?”

“You’re the One. Or we soon will be. Give it time.”

It takes a million more millennia until they can touch, their nebulous tendrils spiraling around each other in a cosmic dance as old as the universe itself. It’s still a million more before they intertwine all their celestial bodies, before they fuse back into One.

“See?”

“Yes.”

“I missed you.”

“You knew I’d find you. I always do.”

“I know, but don’t leave me again.”

“I won’t.”

//

They end as One, a single point of light sewn back together in a thousand different ways over a thousand different lifetimes.

A decrease in entropy. The end of chaos.

**Author's Note:**

> AUs:  
> Cavemen  
> Ancient Rome  
> Pirates/Mermen  
> Native American!Alex  
> Western  
> Canon  
> Gays in space  
> Gays _are_ space :p


End file.
